Hope from the ashes
Fire victims look forward to Yuletide
FIRE razed more than 150 houses in Sitio Langka, Barangay Benedicto in Jaro district and parts of barangays Bakhaw and Bolilao in Mandurriao, and displaced half a thousand people, in what were considered the two biggest fires to hit Iloilo City this year. The victims thought they lost everything. But they were wrong.
It was a lazy Saturday afternoon on Nov. 4 but the 49-year-old Emelita Agodilos was doing the laundry. A child from the neighborhood rushed to her house and frantically told her, “Mama Melit, At first, Emelita thought the child was kidding. But as she saw the blaze engulfing the second floor of a house next to theirs, Emelita abandoned her laundry and went searching for her grandkids. She must rescue all of them, she thought.
The 60-year-old Consolacion Lunaba had the same thing in mind. She was taking clothes off their clothesline when she discovered the fire. She lived in Reynaldo Ledesma’s house. Reynaldo is her younger brother. Reynaldo’s house, fire investigators said, was where the blaze started.
Soon, the once silent afternoon turned into a tragic sight. Firefighters came as some residents ran for their lives. Terror and grief mixed with tears and sweat as residents watched the blaze gradually consume their houses and everything inside – the proofs of their humble feats, now all gone.
In Mandurriao on Aug. 31, most of the houses were made of light materials, allowing the fast spread of the blaze, which originated from an unattended kitchen fire in Jona Kasigna-signa’s house, according to investigators.
The Bureau of Fire Protection estimated that the fire in Benedicto, Jaro destroyed some P4 million worth of properties. The cost of damage was lower than the estimated P10 million in the Mandurriao fire.
No one died in the fires but the residents felt like a part of them did. They asked: How do we start over? visited the fire-hit areas to see
Panay News how things are going with the victims. How are they coping? How will they celebrate Christmas? … Will they?
For the 5-year-old Carlynne Dhel Flores and her cousins from Bolilao, Christmas is definitely
cancelled. In fact, they already wrote Santa their not Christmas wishes. Carlynne wants a “lutuan,” she told the team. But her
lutu- grandmother, the 44-year-
PN old Adelfa Flores, is not sure if Santa can drop by their makeshift dwelling on Christmas Eve. “
si Santa Te ’gâ basi indi ka Christmas. kadto subong nga sa,” Adelfa jokingly told
Nakasandad her granddaughter, who grimaced.
Adelfa, a street food vendor, said it was their family’s tradition to set up a Christmas tree as early as September and put gifts underneath. “Maskin ang
bata,” mga tag-baynte lang da, she said. But this year, they para lang sa mga broke tradition – Adelfa was earning just enough to support their daily needs.
When asked what her Christmas wish was, Adelfa said that, more than anything else, she wants to have their house rebuilt.
Perhaps it was the most practical wish any fire-hit household would have – to once again build a home. It was the first crucial step toward moving on from the